Atlas Shrugged Part II and the “Real” Paul Ryan

Jordan Bloom has investigated how the second Atlas Shrugged movie was made. He spoke with the film’s producers, and this is one of the things they told him:

Despite its marketing “Atlas Shrugged Part II“ isn’t exactly a movement propaganda film; Aglialoro speaks of the “fear” in the Republican Party to “embrace capitalism.” He sees Paul Ryan’s attempt to distance himself from Rand as a capitulation, though a necessary one. “I think the real Paul Ryan would be the Paul Ryan that spoke at the Atlas Society in 2005 and said he had given books away, applauded what she did, and that he believes in a moral basis for capitalism. I believe that’s what he believes, but for some reason there is this hesitancy of accepting Ayn Rand.”

It’s that “for some reason” qualification that makes this such an entertaining quote, as if there were a mystery about why someone might not be eager to continue identifying himself with a terrible writer with so many abhorrent ideas. It isn’t flattering for Ryan to think that he would just pretend to like something so plainly antithetical to the Gospel, but it would be so much more discrediting if he actually believed this stuff. It’s natural that a Rand fan would hope that this is who the “real” Ryan is, but it’s hard to believe all the same.

There’s a strong desire among many of Ryan’s critics and admirers to think that he genuinely accepts at least some of Rand’s ideas. That’s strange considering that Ryan’s voting record is almost exactly the opposite of what a true-believing Rand fan would have done in Congress. Then again, it’s doubtful that a true-believing Rand fan would have run for public office in the first place, much less spent his entire adult career as a politician. The absurdity of all of this is that Ryan was most vocal in his Rand-enthusiasm when he was serving in the Republican majority and casting all of those votes for government-expanding, deficit-financed legislation in the Bush years that supposedly made him so “miserable.” If the “real” Paul Ryan was the one from 2005, he is someone who says one thing and then votes in an entirely different way.

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19 Responses to Atlas Shrugged Part II and the “Real” Paul Ryan

I’m not sure exactly who was the source of this quote, but I always found it to describe exactly as I feel about Atlas Shrugged:

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs.”

Scott Walker promised in his run for governor that he would create 250,000 private sector jobs but the state is not on pace to reach that goal. This week, Walker unveiled a new “In Wisconsin” ad campaign aimed at getting companies to move from Illinois and Minnesota to Wisconsin. Under the pretext to help him out, the NFL Replacement Refs should consider setting up their headquarters in Kenosha. Kenosha is a suburb of Chicago not Milwaukee so FIB plans to annex Kenosha might be accelerated if Replacement Refs are there to ______ the Cheeseheads again.

I think there’s a conceptual two-step that resolves the seeming contradictions between Rand’s philosophy and Ryan’s career, and that it can be generalized.

In the most morally defensible construction of Randianism*, the maker/taker divide is an injunction: you are doing something, now, that is productive. You are acting, now, in a self-reliant way. Or you are, instead, now, having others pick up your tab. With this mindset, you are always holding your current behavior to an unforgiving standard.

That’s too hard of course, so that’s not what people do. “Maker” and “Taker” get essentialized as qualities of a character rather than evaluations of action. I have the character of a producer rather than that of a moocher. I am good enough, and smart enough, and dog goneit I am deserving. Those people across town have the character of moochers rather than producers, even though, as a minor curiosity, they work two jobs a night.

At that point, any benefit that flows to you is deserved, even if it comes from the government, for you have the character of a maker, and any benefit that flows to them is corrupt, for they have the character of a moocher.

I think it’s really easy to see how this idea of election aligns with otherwise incompatible Christian doctrine, in its American evangelical flavor, on the personal level, and with a seemingly anti-libertarian doctrine of American exceptionalism on the national level. It’s the third leg of a stool of self-regard.

At that point, any benefit that flows to you is deserved, even if it comes from the government, for you have the character of a maker, and any benefit that flows to them is corrupt, for they have the character of a moocher.

This explains a lot. As Craig T. Nelson said on Fox, describing his up-by-the-bootstraps rise, “I’ve been on foodstamps and welfare, did anyone help me out? No.”

Is like the criticism aimed at rabid leftists, that the most vocal are those who are actually from well-to-do families? And so likewise, the vocal Randians like Ryan are actually those who benefited greatly in their lives from govt.

How many among you have taken the time to Read Atlas Shrugged? How many of those among you have read and studied her philosophy so that they can speak intelligently. The thing is most people feel that they know what the book is about because they hear about it everywhere. The message is distorted and transmitted back at us from the liberal media so often and so consistently that you don’t know the real Ayn Rand and you certainly don’t know Atlas Shrugged.

Ayn Rand was an advocate for individualism. She value man’s creative mind and his/her ability to reason. That was at the forefront of her entire belief.
She spoke of looters and producers. Most would have you believe that you have to be a wealthy CEO or the equivalent to be a producer. That is completely false. She was quoted as saying “There is no such thing as a lousy job – only lousy men who don’t care to do it.” She is not saying that everyone on unemployment is a looter. She is advocating that personal responsibility and the will to act should be praised while those too lazy to act should be forced to reconsider their ill advised values.
It is unfortunate that Ryan would feel the need to distance himself from the ideas Rand discussed. However, with the media purposely distorting Rand’s ideas, he has a limited amount of mediums in which he can try to articluate his views. None of which are as easily accessible as the liberally owened Media.

I’m not a huge Ayn Rand follower, and I don’t subscribe to her philosophy of Objectivism, but Atlas Shrugged is scarily similar to the modern day US. Bottom line, 99% of what the US federal government does is stealing from some and giving it away: welfare, warfare, foreign aid, etc. Looking forward to the new movie! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AF9QT43uDQU

Ayn Rand saw that the best way to promote freedom in a society at the individual level is through free-market capitalism driven by objectivism and selft interest with as little government involvement as possible. This obviously works given the historical evidence every time it has been tried. Is it perfect? No. No system is! But it is the best system for the individual, and hence the everyone.

And for those that have been taught to hate big-corporations…how do you defend the fact that these are ‘public’ corporations. They can be purchased and controlled by the citizens…to both share in the risk and reap the reward. And if society as a whole deems the corporation not worthy for whatever reason, they can put them out of business or force them to change their ways by voting with their dollars. I dare say a much better system than allowing desk bureaucrats the power to make the decision for millions of people when they are fully capable on their own.

Nobody I know “hates big corporations.” Not slavishly adoring them != hate. Corporations are legal entities created for profit. They act accordingly. Sometimes the results aren’t great. Sometimes it is pretty great. Complaining when the results are suboptimal is not “hating.”

Ayn Rand saw that the best way to promote freedom in a society at the individual level is through free-market capitalism driven by objectivism and selft interest with as little government involvement as possible

Ayn Rand, to be fair to her, fled the USSR. Trouble was she saw the USSR lurking behind the mixed economy we developed here in the US.

Many have written defenses of market capitalism. Few have elevated selfishness to a virtue (the greatest virtue?) as Rand did. Few developed such ridiculous characters.

Ken, every real-world success has been of the mixed economy. Mixed economies have, in fact, been spectacularly successful. Less mixed economies – much less welfare-state and regulation in Latin America; much less capitalism in China and eastern Europe – have been spectacularly less successful.

There’s just no justifiable jump from “there is strong evidence for the success of the mixed economy at maximizing human freedom and welfare” to “if we remove all the collective, regulatory bits, this country will be even awesomer.”

I first read “Atlas Shrugged” in the late 1950s, and my reaction was the same as that of William F. Buckley: “I had to flog myself to read it”. A review at the time in the “National Review” called the book “totally devoid of morality”.
There is no humor, no humanity in the book.
When stationed in the Army in Italy in the late 1960s, we had 2 posters hanging on our wall. One was the classic “Phi Zappa Krappa” poster, featuring Frank Zappa caught unawares sitting on the “throne”. The other was a depiction of Ayn Rand on a playing card as the Queen of Hearts, smoking a cigar. The title of the Zappa album we listened to at the time could well be a summary of Rand’s philosophy: “We’re Only in it for the Money”.
Rand herself summarized the theme of the book in the very last paragraph of the book, when Galt is leaving the Gulch to return to the world he and his minions have destroyed:

I inadvertenltly used left and right arrows in lieu of quotation marks, resulting in the quote being obliterated. Here it is:
“The road is cleared,” said Galt. “We are going back to the world.”
He raised his hand and over the desolate earth he traced in space the sign of the dollar.